Work begins on Bordeaux ‘wine city’

19th June, 2013 by Rupert Millar

The first stone at what will be Bordeaux’s new wine museum was laid today at the Quai de Bacalan.

The architects model of the Cité du vin at Vinexpo

Due to be completed in 2016, the Cité des Civilisations du Vin will “offer a better understanding of both present and future challenges” for the wine industry as well as exploring the history of wine production through the very earliest civilisations to the present day.

The stone was laid in the presence of the city’s mayor, Alain Juppé, Sylvie Cazes, president of Cité des Civilisations du Vin, Michel Delpuech, Prefect of the Aquitaine and Gironde region and Alain Rousset, President of the Aquitaine Regional Council among others.

With the region welcoming around 3.3 million wine visitors alone each year, it is hoped that when completed the museum will attract around 500,000 visitors a year.

It is also expected to generate €40m each year and create 750 jobs – on top of the €30m generated and 600 jobs created in the next three years of its construction. The total cost to build it will be around €67m.

Cazes told the drinks business that as well as being a museum, the Cité would have an exhibition space, restaurants, a panoramic view of the region from the top floor and act as a “platform to send people out into the wider region”.

Visitors will be able to catch boats up river to the Médoc from the quay.

Cazes did stress though that the Cité des Civilisations du Vin would celebrate, “not just French wines” but wine and wine history from around the world.

More generally, the Cité will be part of a completely revitalised area of Bordeaux, a city which has seen major improvements under the mayoralty of Juppé.

Speaking to the press at Château Mouton Rothschild on Sunday 16 June, Juppé proudly announced that Bordeaux was recently voted the second most desirable city in France to live – after Paris.

Cité des Civilisations du Vin will be surrounded by more restaurants, new dockside apartments and a maritime museum. It is close to the new Jacques Chaban-Delmas Bridge.